Directory

The Association of Retired Conservationists was organized by a group of retirees from the Wisconsin Conservation Department in the 1960's. By the mid-1970's, the WCD had been combined with the Department of Resource Development to form the Department of Natural Resources, and the retirees group had grown significantly, met monthly for lunch and began inviting speakers to address the group on issues of interest to the members. Today, the organization has more than two hundred members.

website contact: retiredrick@wisarc.org

Obituaries

Packard, Dean		September 2026
Daniels, Beecher		August 2026
Gilson, Lydia C.		June 2026
McCutcheon, Gloria L.		June 2026
Frank, Edward "Ed"		May 2026
Larson, Timothy R.		April 2026
Lueshow, Lloyd		March 2026
Rusch, Doris		March 2026
Penning, Michael J.		March 2026
McNelly, James L.		March 2026
Rodenberg, Jerry		February 2026
Libby, Janet		February 2026
Stautz, Floyd F.		February 2026
Abney, Loyal "Dick"		January 2026
Meyer, George		December 2025
Braun, Bruce B.		December 2025

New Member, September 2026

Helen Hartman

I was hired by the DNR Wildlife Management Program in 2008 after working as a K-7 art teacher in Iowa, being a stay-at-home mom with three children, and working at the Wisconsin Council on Developmental Disabilities.

I was an administrative assistant for the WM Program, with a variety of responsibilities. My bosses were Tom Hauge and Eric Lobner, WM Program directors during my tenure. I loved the job, partly because it was interesting and I learned so much about the natural world. Another reason I loved the job is because I was surrounded by amazing people – hard working, dedicated, and pretty darn cool. I supported various leadership teams, helped put together our statewide meetings, and provided support to the bureau. I especially enjoyed the opportunities to travel, witness work going on in the field, and getting to know field staff.

I retired in 2021. I’m so busy these days that I don’t know how I ever found time to work! I volunteer with several organizations. I enjoy gardening, paddling my kayak, painting, and hanging out with my two rescue dogs. I have two bat houses that are being monitored by the DNR bat team. I also maintain a bee house with mason and leafcutter bees. I have a small pond and lots of native shrubs and trees in my yard, which draws in a lot of critters, including birds, which I thoroughly enjoy watching (except for the common house sparrows with their monotonous chirps). I have three grandchildren in Ann Arbor, MI, and two in Oro Valley, AZ, and between the two I travel a fair amount. I also have a daughter who lives in an adult family home in Madison.

Retired Rick's Critters

We may think of our neighborhoods, yards, and gardens, as places that belong to us.

But after the sun goes down, another world begins.

Go here to see what may be passing through your yard during the darkness of night!

Click here to see the video.

Dave Gjestson's New Book

The book follows the Black Hawk Trail across Illinois and Wisconsin, exploring the historic markers, preservation efforts, and contested memories that still shape how the conflict is understood.

Drawing together the disputed treaty, the destruction of Saukenuk, Stillman’s Run, the Battle of Wisconsin Heights, the massacre at Bad Axe, and the long aftermath of Native removal, The Pursuit of Black Hawk tells the story as both history and moral reckoning.

It examines not only commanders and battles, but graves, cornfields, frightened settlers, divided tribal nations, failed diplomacy, and the bureaucratic machinery that turned signatures into surveys, surveys into settlements, and settlements into war.

Go here to order the book.

Retired Wildlife Management Luncheon

As we do twice a year, retired Wildlifers met at a swanky country club in Black River Falls for lunch and a little camaraderie.

From left to right in the front row are Pat Kaiser, Pete Segerson, Bob Michelson, Tom Howard, Kim Mello, Jim March, John Kubisiak, Dave Gjestson, and Tom Hansen. Second row from right to left are Mark Anderson, Tom Hauge, Bill Ishmael, Dick Thiel, David Linderud, Tom Nigus, and Jim Keir.

New Member, August 2026

Laurie Larson

I successfully harvested my first deer that year at the Sandhill Wildlife Area “Learn to Hunt Deer” event. I highly recommend this program!

I went on to hunt for several years in spite of raising two wonderful human beings and full-time work as a research veterinarian. Those were busy times!

Now that I have retired from University of Wisconsin School of Veterinary Medicine, I expect my days will be filled with gardening, kayaking, hiking the Ice Age Trail, and more.

I have been in training for a hike that will cover about 500 miles of a pilgrimage path through rural villages of southern France and Massif Centrale. Wish me “bon courage” and “DON’T break a leg” as I depart in less than a week.

As a life-long learner, I look forward to learning more about protecting natural resources from this illustrious group of conservationists.

That’s much younger me, Laurie Larson, on the left with my deer hunting mentor and late husband Dennis Presser.

FUN FACT!
That’s much younger me, Laurie Larson, on the left with my deer hunting mentor and late husband Dennis Presser.

August Special Guest Speaker Dr. Patrick Jung

Dr. Patrick J. Jung is a professor of history and cultural anthropology at the Milwaukee School of Engineering, where he has taught since 2003. He received his doctoral degree in American history from Marquette University in 1997. He has written several books and articles on the Native people of the western Great Lakes, including The Black Hawk War of 1832 (2007), The Battle of Wisconsin Heights: Thunder on the Wisconsin (2011), The Nicolet Corrigenda: New France Revisited (2009), and The Misunderstood Mission of Jean Nicolet: Understanding the 1634 Journey (2018). He is currently researching and writing on the lives of the Ho-Chunk people in pre-settlement Wisconsin. Go Here to See the Video.

New Member, May 2026

Ann Scott came to Wisconsin DNR from the American Geographic Society library at UW- Milwaukee where she was the digital spatial librarian. She was hired by DNR Facilities and Lands in September 2006 to produce multitudes of maps and standardize cartography for master planning in the Property Planning section.

In 2012 the opportunity arose for the Real Estate Land Records Officer (now known as the Land Information Officer) position in which she assumed many responsibilities—Land Records System database and application management, DNR Managed Lands database management, interactive mapping applications including the Public Access Lands map application, and the PAL atlas publication. After many bureaucratic shifts she eventually ended up in DNR IT at Central Office.

Ann retired in March of 2025 and keeps busy through volunteering at Olbrich Botanical Gardens, captaining her team in the DNR golf league, working the polls at election time, gardening, and herding her family through everyday life. She and her husband Gary look forward to more traveling and kayaking/canoeing now that both of them are retired.

West Central Wildlife Management Reunion

Front row sitting, left to right: Eldon McLaury, Don Bates, Tim Andryk, John Dunn, Tom Bahti, John Cole, and David Linderud Back row standing, left to right: Jim Keir, Kim Mello, Jim March, David Gjestson, Jon Bronsdon, Tom Howard, Bill Ishmael, Dick Thiel, Jim Raber, Tom Hauge, John Kubisiak, Doug Fendry, Terry Valen, and Mike Gappa The biannual Black River Falls reunion of wildlife management research retirees took place on April 9,2026. They will meet again in August.

February Special Guest Speaker J. Paul White

The State of White-nose Syndrome and Wind Energy Policy As a mammal ecologist and coordinator of the WDNR Wisconsin Bat Program, J. Paul White oversees critical research and volunteer initiatives aimed at conserving our native bat species. In his presentation, he will provide updates on the state of White-nose Syndrome and wind energy policy, while sharing new insights into bat ecology, natural history, and the innovative projects tracking their survival across the Wisconsin landscape. Paul’s interest in wildlife and the outdoors began while growing up in the small town of Mercer. It was in the Northwoods where he developed an appreciation and passion for Wisconsin’s flora and fauna. While he specializes in bats, he has worked on projects focusing on small mammals, American marten, deer, fish and birds. Go Here to See the Video.

The retired DNR Landscape Architects met recently at David Aslakson's home in Green County. Attached is a photo of us -- standing in the back, from left to right is: Mike Ries, Bill Moorman, Dan Rogers, Jim Treichel; middle row: Pam Schuler and Therese Gripentrog; and Lyle Hannahs and David Aslakson are seated left to right, respectively.